asgardmeridiem | Preparations (Closed)

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Preparations (Closed)

Who: Samantha Grey and Uther Pendragon
What: Tactical Discussions and Awkward first meetings
When: d155, day
Where: Library
Rating: PG

Samantha made her way into the library after sending Uther a note on when she would meet him. She had a leather satchel over her shoulder with a series of tubes in it, one for each of the districts. Keeping extra copies of them seemed a good call at this point, so she'd brought these instead of the originals.

Personally, she was smiling at the moment. It was another of those times when it felt good to actually be useful. The maps hadn't seen much use with Niccolo, but she hadn't wanted to completely give up on the project. Updated notes on the damage from the Darkness were there, though the repairs were probably still in progress at some points. Hopefully it would help all the same.

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Very obviously not human. Uther hadn't tried to build up any good expectations of meeting Samantha in person, but it still caught him a little off-guard, left him on edge. He was definitely more tense and probably slightly hostile than nervous, and he doubted deep breaths would help her.

So he tried rolling his shoulders instead as he sat down opposite of her, giving her a nod. "Go ahead."

He felt like he could use walking away for a while to calm down, but it didn't particularly feel like that was possible. So he would stay and hope they could get this over with quickly enough.

She could catch that he was on edge. While not the most empathic of people, certain cues were obvious and generally good ones to watch for when you needed to be quick on your toes to survive. It didn't matter. She had been keeping some distance from him physically because she expected this sort of thing. Rather than draw attention to it, she plowed on, her tail lashing lazily behind her.

The map was unrolled out onto the table in a moment and on it she displayed Loki District. A series of blue lines formed what looked like a small web with the two principle hubs at the district's House and moving in towards the castle itself. Secondary connecting points were dotted all throughout, all of them marked. "A Pinch of Sage" was situated at one of the ones with multiple lines passing through it.

"We'll start with the blue. In my world, there's a teaching called geomancy. Various ways of thinking about it, but the idea is that magical energy flows through the land itself," she explained, pointing at the blue lines. "I think something similar exists here. In every district, there are places where magic used to happen. Shops with curiosities, alchemy labs, that sort of thing. A lot of them are completely lost now, but it sounds like that came with the grey. This place used to have much more magic active, and the lines connect these different points. When the color is brought back, they start to wake up again."

"Basically, the long and short is that wherever these lines cross, there's more power. The biggest connecting points are at Loki's house and the castle. Considering they have the greatest color to begin with, that shouldn't surprise anyone. If the color can be brought out more at these points, the magic in each district will probably increase, though what that means isn't easy to say. We know about runic magic, which connects some ongoing effect to a set of runes etched into stone or an object, and alchemy. We don't know if there were other powers for sure yet."

This was the point where Uther started questioning what he was even doing with his life anyway. He was sitting here, at a table, with a half-demon, listening to her explain magic to contemplate if it can be any use to him so he can let people know how to work with their magic. Had he heard about this even a couple of weeks earlier, he wouldn't have believed it.

Asgard was changing him, ruining everything he had previously thought and stood for, and it was terrifying. It took every bit of effort from him to sit her, but this was for the sake of people's lives, people who hadn't done anything bad, people who deserved to live. He couldn't just ignore that. He couldn't. Not...

Not anymore.

Breathing was good, he had to remember to breathe.

This was business, purely business. And business here was very different from back in Camelot.

"Do you think there could be a connection to the abilities they give us?"

The ironies involved in the two of them working together were almost visible, tangible things. The why of it wasn't entirely clear to her, but it was enough to know he was still sitting there, looking over it. She reached up and scratched at the back of her head when he asked the question, her tone showing the doubt that was there.

"Not sure," she responded. "The truth is that we're really not clear on the magic. According to an impish little letter Loki tossed at Jade, the powers are connections to the souls of the gods. Chances are, if he's not bullshitting us, which I will not discount yet, then that means that those eighteen or so magics are all powers that are drawn from these gods and still work because the gods are above the grey. Alchemy and runes still work because they can keep the magic stored in them somehow, maybe. If these things are related, then yes. The lines are connected. The more we wake them up, the more power's in this city, and the more tricks we can get up our sleeve."

And, at this point, she looked at him. Her blood red eyes had a certain haunted, nervous look to them, like somebody who knew things they really didn't like knowing. "I've got a concern, all the same. The thing is that we don't know if these gods are at full strength or not. If we wake up all the lines and put them at full power, I don't entirely trust them. I just trust the giants a lot less. There's also always the possibility that there's darker, forgotten magics that are locked and stored away somewhere. Waking those up might give people access to crap I don't want to deal with, and crap I don't think anyone wants to deal with. I want to wake them up, because I think this is one of our best bets, but I'm not sure about what the end result is going to be. There's too much we don't know yet."

And that was scary, all the more frightening than just the concept of magic itself. Uther felt his skin crawl like it hadn't in a while at the thought of darker magic hidden, at the thought of their magic and energy increasing the power of the gods, who might not have been completely well-meaning.

Too many unknowns for dealing with magic if you asked him, and yet... That was all they had.

"A double-edged sword, then. Possibly. If so, I believe the question is how bad this war is," he said while he leaned his chin on his knuckles, almost pressing them into it, resisting the urge to rub his forehead. He wasn't getting tired, or affected. Couldn't show that he was. "If we need to focus on waking the lines up."

To him, it was sounding like a last resort, a desperate idea. But it sounded like it needed some work, in which case they couldn't think about it too long, or wait too long.

She nodded, tapping at one of the lines. "I think we should only devote a limited amount of expendable resources, the sort who are skilled in this type of thing, on this. We don't know quite what to do with this yet. It's something for the backpocket, the hidden dagger just in case," she said, sounding very much as if she agreed with some of his sentiments. "It's an unknown quantity and I don't want too many people focusing on it when we have things we know work."

"As for how bad the fight is, the last attack's what tells me the most. The fact that they actually used a biological weapon is a good sign they mean business," she said, tapping at a point in Loki. "They plan to kill us all. And if they're going to do another strike and aim for Loki, this is one of two points I'd say would be best. The other's the house itself. This is where the roads converge best for easy spread. I think they avoided Loki because, dense or not, it's low end housing. Very cramped. Slow movement."

She knew what she was talking about, and from the sounds of it she wasn't the only one. This was a very, very good thing, and Uther liked that. Hard to really focus on that when there was so much else, almost trying to tear him away, away from what mattered most now.

He wasn't used to trying to think magic didn't matter, but that was how it was now. It couldn't be seen as the greatest threat. It was difficult.

"But they could aim for it. It's important that we try to decide where they're more likely to strike," he said, frowning down at the map. "We need to be ready this time."

Samantha was no master tactician, but 'survival' was a very powerful teacher at times. In the last year of her life, she had picked up several little pieces that had taught her a lot about fighting solo, particularly in cramped or impromptu quarters. It had also taught her to recognize the difference between real threats and bluster. This war was a real threat, something she'd become sure of after a tornado nearly sucked her out of that house during the darkness event.

"They will attack it eventually, definitely," she said, reaching over and pulling a second map out, covering the table completely at this point. It was of Sigyn district. "This district, however, is one of the ones we're going to need to watch. This is one of the first targets I'd strike if I wanted to kill everyone here."

Her finger jabbed down right on top of the hospital. Samantha wasn't well versed in war, but she knew targets when she saw them, and when she fought, she fought for keeps.

Survival was a very powerful teacher, indeed. Uther had learned a lot from it, even if plenty of those learnings were being questioned from several directions since he came here. But this, he could at least do. This was normal, a comfort. Thinking of strategies, trying to predict where the enemy would strike.

Even if this would have to involve magic (and not just to be against it), and even if it was war, it was something. It was fine.

"The hospital," he said, nodded and frowned deeply. "Not only would it take away a great deal of our ability to help the wounded, but it would likely leave the city in shock. If we're not prepared enough."

Something to consider. He would have to pass it onto Arthur.

Her finger began to fan out and go over the streets from the hospital. She pointed to small notations, and each time she did the nature of them became clearer. They contained measurements of the street in terms of how many traveled along it, how many egress points and the kind of cover expected.

Sigyn was wide open, and the hospital had many ways to get into it. "The problem with defending it is that it's just not defensible. I've been in, and they've got at least two ways into the hospital itself and a whole slew of streets leading in. Makes sense. It's meant for healing people, but if there's a real fight, protecting it will be hard," she said. "In fact, my view on Sigyn's that the whole place is great for getting around easily, but not for hiding. Low income areas are better for that. Tighter-knit streets, dingy cooridors, busy alleys and the like."

Uther nodded. Wide spaces could be useful in battle every now and then, but definitely not for hiding.

And the hospital seemed more of a problem. Although...

"It might be possible to use the hospital," he said, folding his hands in front of his face. "But it wouldn't be easy. It would be a question of choosing between levels of how risky every option would be."

It would never be completely safe. But they couldn't just move it, either.

"How does the clinic we have look?"

She considered and rolled up the map of Loki before pulling out the one of Heimdall. Unfurliing it, she motioned to the house that was converted into Yakuzen's old clinic. "It can't handle large numbers, and it's more secure than the Hospital itself. If you're looking to set up some sort of secondary healing station, I actually suggest the Arena or something similar," she explained, shaking her head.

"What are you thinking about as far as using the hospital? Scale of one to ten, how crazy are we talking?"

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Preparations (Closed)

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How does time keep running away from me so

So easy sometimes, in't?

Very. Sob.

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